2020 Revised Framework for Conducting Environmental Assessments of Trade Negotiations - 2021-01-01

The environmental assessment (EA) of trade agreements is one of three complementary assessments undertaken by Global Affairs Canada (GAC) to evaluate the impacts of Canada’s trade policy initiatives. In parallel with Economic Impact Assessments and Gender-Based Analysis + (GBA+), EAs aim to assess the impacts of prospective international trade agreements against environmental sustainability priorities, as set out in Canada’s current Federal Sustainable Development Strategy (FSDS). Since 2001, GAC has been conducting environmental assessments of its international trade negotiations, further to the Cabinet Directive on the Environmental Assessment of Policy, Plan and Program Proposals. This directive provides guidelines to departments and agencies in their conduct of strategic environmental assessments of policies, plans and program proposals. Building on these guidelines, GAC developed its own framework for the environmental assessment of trade negotiations, which takes into account the environmental implications of trade agreements and the international context in which they are negotiated. As such, EAs closely align with the negotiation process and begin as early as possible at…

Publisher

Global Affairs Canada

Resources

2

Catalogue metadata updated

2026-07-20